A Big Ditch in NY Helped Create Idaho and Utah Culture

How is an old, worn-out canal in upstate New York related to Idaho?  On Sunday, the 200th anniversary of the Erie Canal's opening is being celebrated.  The work was completed under budget and on schedule, without any assistance from the federal government.  The work was completed without power tools, and some 2,500 Irish immigrants had the dirtiest jobs, including one named Colley, who bequeathed me a last name.

The canal opened up the west, or what was known as the west at the time, and revolutionized commerce in the young United States.  It also coincided with a religious revival that was sweeping the region, and that quickly spread along the canal route.  A young man from Fayette, New York, named Joseph Smith, had a revelation, and it spread like wildfire through canal towns, including one small outpost named Port Byron, the home of a man named Brigham Young.  I worked with one of his relatives in the late 1980s.  She still lived in Port Byron.

Today, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is worldwide, but its firmest ground is Utah, Nevada, and Idaho.  Without the canal, it may have gone in a different geographical direction.

As a side note, my hometown had a small feeder canal and a lake as a reservoir, which, when constructed, was the largest man-made lake in North America.  The old canal was nothing but a mosquito breeding ground when I was a kid, but it froze in winter and was great for skating.

Our elementary school choirs were taught a song about the project, which you can watch below.